


Ain't Nobody's Hands Clean in What's Left of This World

by CaroltheQueen (always_1895)



Category: The 100 (TV), The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Canon-Typical Violence, Crossover, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Romance, Shower Sex, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-16
Updated: 2016-12-16
Packaged: 2018-09-08 21:09:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8862115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/always_1895/pseuds/CaroltheQueen
Summary: The world has long belonged to the dead, and Abby Griffin spends every day just trying to keep herself and her post-Turn family alive. To keep them safe from walkers and humans alike.  Somehow she's managed to come this far without taking the life of a living person, but now she knows just how far she will go to protect the ones she loves.  I was prompted on Tumblr to either write The 100 characters in TWD 'verse, or TWD characters in The 100. I chose the former. May yet do the latter too.





	1. Chapter 1

Abby can’t stop shaking. She’s collapsed to her knees on the muddy ground but can’t feel the damp or the cold seeping through her jeans. Distantly, the doctor in her (Is she even a doctor anymore? A doctor swears to do no harm…) recognises it’s either shock or the adrenaline crash after running for their lives. Again. Her heart is thundering, her breathing harsh to her own ears.

Around her the others are catching their breath too, but already murmuring amongst themselves, distracted by practicalities rather than letting themselves dwell on the horror they’d just escaped from. Abby hears her daughter, no longer a child in this brutal world, far more composed and focused than she, talking to Bellamy.

_No guns._

_Too exposed._

_No food or water._

The meagre possessions they’d held onto had been taken from them in the City. All Abby has left are the clothes on her back, the wedding ring of the husband she’d had to put down that she daren’t clutch for comfort now with her bloodied hands, and the knife she’d used to fight her way out.

“Abby,” Marcus is crouched in front of her, suddenly. His warm, brown eyes are pained, and so, so tired. Abby frowns at the wounds on his wrists: jagged, deep, exposed. Besides the dead and other people, infection is their worst enemy now, and Abby’s medical bag is gone. She’d killed a man who’d once been her friend to save Marcus’ life, to save all of them, but he could still die out here anyway.

She reaches out to take one of his hands in hers, and he lets her; touch is an easy thing between them now. There is dirt and blood marring his skin as much as hers, she knows not all of it is his.

“I’m sorry, Abby.” He looks at her as if it is his fault, as if he somehow forced her to do what had to be done, “I wanted so badly to keep you from this.” And she can hear in his voice just how badly, the way he chokes out the words.

“You couldn’t protect me from it forever.”

These are the first words she’s said since they escaped, scraping from her parched and raw throat. She remembers her own screams for Jaha and his followers to stop overlapping with Marcus’ screams of pain. She reaches out and strokes his face, thinking of how close she came to seeing a walker’s snapping jaws tear into it. Marcus leans into her touch.

“I just… I know you hate dealing with the walkers. I never wanted you to have to… I thought I could keep doing it for you.”

He would, she knows. He’d take on the guilt and weight of taking each life to spare her. The knowledge makes her want to pull him into her arms, kiss him until all they can think about is each other, and shut out the memories of everything they’ve done. The desire no longer surprises her; maybe she would do it if they ever found a moment to want more for themselves beyond simply surviving. If they could find somewhere and stop running. But the world belongs to the dead now, and there are no safe havens. They’d learnt that over and over with the Ark, Mount Weather, and now the City of Light.

“I know,” She breathes, looking at him, hearing their ragtag little family move around them, and feeling a fierce resolve. “But this is the world now. You would kill the living to protect me, to protect Clarke. I have to be prepared to do the same.”

Marcus looks so sad, as if he is mourning the last of her innocence more than she is, and Abby wonders how she could ever have thought him heartless. That first time she, Clarke, Thelonious and Wells had come across Marcus and his group, barely a month after the Turn and running from a dozen or so walkers that, back then, they were unable to defeat themselves, she’d watched him and Bellamy take them all out without flinching and thought them callous, disrespectful of the dead. She’d been naive.

Because she hadn’t known then, hadn’t known for a while (since Marcus isn’t exactly the forthcoming sort with strangers), that he was pushing it all away, forcing the emotion deep down inside, in order to keep putting one foot in front of the other. In order to not think about shooting his own mother in the head even though it wasn’t really her anymore. Just as Abby tries not to think about Jake. She hadn’t yet understood that they couldn’t afford to hesitate or flinch if they wanted to survive, nor that Marcus’ heart is almost constantly bleeding for everyone else, but never thinks himself worthy of compassion.

That had been back before her daughter had grown hard; before they’d met Finn and Raven, and Clarke fell in love with the boy she’d eventually have to put down. Before they’d lost Wells and Thelonious had lost his mind. Now, when Clarke mutters “Walker”, strides through the trees over to a lone, shambling corpse and plunges her stolen blade through its eye socket, Abby no longer flinches, but she still feels a pang in her heart for the gentle, artistic girl Clarke once was. 

The abrupt movement seems to snap her back to her senses, the numbness of shock dissipating and the world, along with the aching in her body, comes back with painful clarity. She knows they cannot linger any longer, no matter how much she might want to just lie down on the forest floor with Marcus and sleep. They have to find shelter, somewhere they can hopefully raid for supplies. In the very least, they have to find water that she can boil and clean Marcus’ wounds with.

“We have to go.” Lincoln speaks before she can; standing tall and imposing as always, the only sign that he is remotely shaken by what they’ve just been through is how he keeps Octavia’s hand clasped tightly in his own. Bellamy’s little sister looks pale and small next to him, a bleak contrast to the fighting whirlwind Abby knows her to be.

Raven struggles to her feet from where she, like Abby, had fallen to the ground. With one prosthetic leg, Abby thinks it’s a miracle that she made it out with the rest of them, even with Bellamy practically carrying her. The prosthetic is better than most, Raven had built it herself from scavenged parts. When the younger woman had been bitten, it had been Abby who’d had to amputate her leg out of sheer desperation. Without anaesthetic, Raven’s screams tore through all of them, until she, mercifully, lost consciousness. Abby had thrown up afterwards, Marcus’ hand warm and steadying between her shoulder blades, trying to comfort her. Bellamy steps forward to loop his arm around Raven’s waist again, and Abby knows she is exhausted when she doesn’t offer any protest.

Lincoln and Octavia take point, Marcus brings up the rear just behind Abby, and together they start walking as quietly as possible. They fall into soundless communication that has kept them alive many times over, each hyper-aware of their surroundings, but relying now on Lincoln’s unparalleled ability to read the woods to guide them towards salvation. Abby can hear the exhaustion in everyone’s footsteps and silently wills them to hold on, even if she’s struggling to hold on to hope herself. The blood coating her hands is dry and sticky now, and as the light starts to fade there is cold dread forming in the pit of her stomach.

They keep going, keep pressing forward, efficiently taking out stray walkers as they go, but the longer they go without finding water the more Abby despairs, her mind fixated on Marcus’ open wounds. She can’t stop glancing back at them, and each time he tries to give her a reassuring smile, wordlessly telling her not to worry, though it doesn’t reach his eyes. He is already pale, face pinched in pain.

Finally, as dusk is falling, they all hear the tell tale rushing noise of a nearby stream and collectively breathe a sigh of relief.

“Well done, babe,” Octavia whispers to Lincoln. It’s the first time anyone has spoken in hours.

They’ve lost the light anyway, so they make “camp” (such as it is, with no bedrolls, blankets, or supplies of any kind), and, as Clarke starts a fire, Abby immediately crouches by the water to wash her hands as best she can. As she watches the crusted blood dissolve away in a rust-coloured cloud, it hits her, devastatingly, that they have no container in which they can collect or boil the water. Just as she’s sure she’s going to cry, Raven appears next to her holding out a worn and dented metal mug.

“You all grabbed the nearest weapon and nothing else, but I figured if we didn’t actually die trying to get out of there, we’d probably need this.” She shrugs like it’s not a big deal, “Sorry I couldn’t find anything else.”

Before she can even finish speaking, Abby is hugging her and, for what feels like the thousandth time, thanking God for Raven, who is always five steps ahead when everyone else is lost in panic.

Raven snorts, “Are you gonna cry over a sorry excuse for a mug?”

It actually makes Abby laugh, and she draws back, sniffing, “You know, I just might.”

Raven shakes her head, “This is what it’s come to.” She’s only half joking, and they both know it.

It’s a slow, tedious process, boiling water and waiting for it to cool over and over again for everyone to drink, especially since Abby, ignoring Marcus’ protests, insists on using the first batch to bathe his wrists. She tears a couple strips of cloth from the bottom of her shirt, making sure he doesn’t notice, and boils them too, in the hopes of binding the wounds and keeping them covered with the cleanest bandage they can get right now, which isn’t saying much. He’ll notice when she eventually wraps them, but at that point there will be no use in arguing.

They sit hunched together in the darkness, Abby bowed so close over his wrists to see what she’s doing that each exhale of his stirs her hair. Marcus grits his teeth but can’t help the small hisses of pain that escape as she gently tries to cleanse raw, damaged flesh of dirt and grit. It means washing away the places where the holes have already started to scab and making them bleed afresh. The nails that had done the damage hadn’t been clean, and Abby has no way of gauging the internal trauma save for the range of movement Marcus still has in his hands; she doesn’t think anything is broken.

He flinches again and Abby feels a sob brewing in her chest. As if he senses her distress, he murmurs,

“You’re doing everything you can.”

It only makes her urge to cry worse, because of course he’s trying to comfort her when he’s the one in pain.

“We should never have gone to that place. We should never have trusted Thelonious. I was the one who -”

“He was your friend, Abby. For years. You can’t know everything. We can’t predict what people will do anymore.”

Her next words make her feel sick, but she says them anyway because she knows he has to have been thinking about it, too. “You can’t lose your hands.” He would be defenceless, helpless. It would be as good as a death sentence. Her voice breaks, “You can’t.”

She’s finished cleaning and wrapping his wrists, and now she simply holds them in her lap, running her thumbs over his knuckles.

“Hey,” His rough whisper is enough to get her to raise her head, and he tilts his forehead down to press against hers. “It’ll be okay.”

They stay that way for a moment, sharing breaths. This is new, this intimacy, but it feels as natural as breathing. Abby lets herself draw strength and comfort from the feel of him so close, and doesn’t let herself think about a world without him in it.

“We should try and sleep.” He says, eventually, though they both know how little likelihood there is of anyone sleeping tonight.

The fire makes them a target to both walkers and anyone else who might be out there, people who might have survived and followed them from the City of Light, and in the darkness, without guns, they won’t be able to do anything about a threat until it’s already on them. But without the heat they risk hypothermia, exposed as they are to the cold night air.

Clarke and Bellamy are on watch, which is always another source of worry to Abby, when her daughter isn’t lying beside her. She lays back on the cold, hard ground, leaves rustling beneath her as she tries futility to get comfortable. Marcus and Raven are warm at least, pressed against her on either side, and on the other side of the fire Lincoln and Octavia lie wrapped up in each other. Abby stares up at the sky, overcast and starless, and tries to focus on the presence of her family; the rise and fall of Marcus’ chest at her back, and Raven snuggling closer to her warmth. Clarke is only a couple of feet away, she tells herself.

Exhaustion weighs on her enough that sleep does come, but only in fits and starts. Every rustle or twig snapping out in the woods is enough to jolt her awake, painfully aware of how vulnerable they are. She knows everyone else feels the same when they all practically spring to their feet as Bellamy deals with a stray walker, and their hearts are pounding for at least an hour after that, waiting for more to come.

When Abby slips down deep enough, the nightmares are bad, as she knew they would be. It’s a slide show of horrors old and new, mixed together. She sees the groaning face of the thing that was once Jake, feels the sickening crunch as she’d hit it with the vase in their living room, blood and glass raining on the carpet. She sees Thelonious smiling coldly, all traces of her old friend gone, ready to let her family be torn apart by teeth, and the knife in her hand is slicing through the fragile skin of his neck all over again, blood gushing, hot and coppery all over her hands.

Abby wakes over and over with the screams of her loved ones ringing in her ears.


	2. Chapter 2

_Clarke is crying, “Mom, we can’t! We can’t just leave him! He’s just sick! Dad’s hurt and he’s sick and he needs us!”_

_“Baby, he stopped breathing… For half an hour… That’s…“ She chokes. Afraid, so afraid, "That’s not your father.”_

_Another voice now; calm, detached, “We don’t need to fear them, Abby, they’re us. They’re the next stage of the human race. You don’t have to run anymore, you don’t have to be scared, or hungry, or in pain. You can be free.” Thelonious smiles and her veins turn to ice._

_“Please, don’t do this.” Her voice, every part of her, is trembling. Marcus’ cries have fallen silent, but he takes great, shuddering breaths. Blood running from his wrists, tears down her cheeks. “Please…”_

_“It’s their world now, Abby. We need to surrender.”_

_Thelonious nods and a walker is set free, snarling and staggering towards Marcus, and Abby is sick with fear and horror because she loves him, oh God does she love him, and he’s about to die in the worse way possible, and she will witness every agonising moment, and she **can’t** do this again…_

Abby gasps into wakefulness, bolting upright and almost head butting Clarke, who is hovering over her, in the process. At first she thinks it was the dream that woke her, but soon raised voices filter through to her, and she locks eyes with her frowning daughter.

“ - should have been me!” Bellamy says, somewhere behind Abby, and he sounds distressed. She twists round to see him facing off with Marcus. “He wanted me, I put Wells down, you should’ve just let him take me!”

“You know I’d never let that happen.” Marcus says calmly, matter-of-fact.

“And now you can barely hold a knife!” Bellamy continues, “It was one walker and it almost got you!”

Abby’s heart seems to seize in her chest and she glances down at Marcus’ wrists, finds the bandages soiled and bloodstained, just as Octavia hisses at her brother,

“Bell, keep it down! You’ll draw more!”

Bellamy looks despairingly at Marcus once more, then turns away, shaking his head. Marcus looks in Abby’s direction, as if sensing her gaze, and the tired resignation on his face makes her unexpectedly furious; it’s like he’s already accepted his fate, like he thinks he’s expendable. Her anger comes through in her voice in her next words to Clarke, though she keeps staring at Marcus,

“We need to go, we need to find supplies. How long has the sun been up?”

Clarke looks startled by her intensity when Abby finally turns to her, but doesn’t comment on it, “Not long. I was about to wake you.”

Abby nods tightly and gets to her feet, dusting herself off even though it’s fairly pointless. She notices Clarke still regarding her warily, “What?”

“Seemed like you were having a nightmare.”

Her tone is neutral, and Abby wonders if she’s imagining the way Clarke carefully does not look at the dried blood stains on Abby’s clothing, or if she’s the only one horribly over-aware of them. Is this Clarke’s attempt to talk about what happened? They never talk about things anymore, it has been so long since Clarke first pulled away after her father died, that Abby has forgotten how to reach out to her, afraid to try, of the accusations Clarke might throw at her. They’ve only grown more distant since the beginning of all this, their way of life now never really lends itself to taking the time they need to repair things between them. As it is, they swing wildly between tense silences and sheer terror that the other person might be about to die. But nightmares and guilt and ghosts? They confide those things to other people now.

As much as Abby wants this heart to heart, now is not the time. Like the moments where she wonders if she and Marcus might be something more, she wonders if it will ever be the right time.

So she simply shrugs and says, “No more than usual.” and pretends not to notice the worry in Clarke’s eyes. She walks over to where the others are standing, ready to move, resolutely not looking at Marcus, for fear that she’ll either yell or cry. Fallen leaves crunch underfoot, and it is a moment before she hears it: the uneven shuffling rustle of more leaves being disturbed nearby, then the low groaning of the dead. Octavia had been right, the argument has attracted their attention.

None of them waste a second longer to find out how many there are, though it sounds like their number goes into double digits. Raven is already ahead of everyone else, trying to get a head start, before it is Lincoln this time who appears next to her, offering a supportive arm.

Clarke and Bellamy are defending their rear, and Abby’s heart is pounding in fear once more. She grips her knife with white knuckles and concentrates on not tripping over random foliage. They don’t need to put on too much speed to stay ahead of them, she knows, but walkers don’t get tired, and the group is already worn down. If they are lucky enough to find somewhere to hole up, they need to take the walkers out before then; taking shelter will be pointless if they end up surrounded with no way out. They need a tactical advantage, Abby thinks. High ground that they can easily use their momentum to push them down hill. A river with just enough of a current that they can cross safely but the walkers get washed away.

In the end it’s a mix of both. By the time they reach the old stone bridge, worn away by weather or time, they are flagging and have about twenty walkers on their trail. The river is high and rushing beneath, and the banks are steep and muddy on either side. Their group reaches the middle of it when they turn and face the small hoard, gripping what few weapons they have and squaring their stances.

“Hey!” Bellamy barks out, striding towards the nearest walker and making sure to draw it towards him.

Keeping his eyes on it, he moves over to the low ledge, then, when it’s almost on him, deftly side steps and pushes the walker over. Whilst Clarke and Octavia follow his lead, Abby falls back to cover Raven, letting Lincoln join them. When Marcus walks past her, Abby shouts his name, remembering Bellamy’s concerns and glancing down at the machete in his grasp. Marcus doesn’t look at her, doesn’t even pause, and Abby feels that flare of anger again at his blatant lack of concern for his own safety, but also at being flat out ignored.

They pick off the first few walkers one by one as Bellamy had, but it quickly descends into chaos and Abby has to engage. She hears an annoyed growl from Raven when she steps in front of her, gesturing for her to stay back, then plunges her knife into a walker’s temple, throwing her weight behind it like Marcus and Lincoln taught her to do. It goes down, nearly taking Abby with it when she struggles to free her weapon. Two more and she’s breathing hard, foul smelling black gunk covering her hands and shirt front.

It’s under control until she hears a yelp, and she turns to see Octavia being yanked backwards by the hair, the walker’s nails grasping ever closer to her scalp; a scratch is just as deadly as a bite. She sees Lincoln, several feet away, whip around instinctively at the sound of Octavia in pain, and in his panic he is distracted from finishing off the walker he was fighting. Abby’s stomach drops and she sees it all play out in her mind’s eye: the walker looming behind him, sinking it’s teeth into his neck, tearing out a chunk of flesh and severing the jugular in a way that is impossible to survive, the violent spray of blood…

Abby is running before she even finishes the thought, Lincoln staring at her as she bolts towards him. She collides with the walker as its teeth are just shy of Lincoln’s skin, thinking she will simply topple to the ground on top of it and drive her blade down, but somehow she’s wound up back on the bank. Her foot slips on the muddy grass and the world tilts dizzyingly on its axis as she’s falling, falling, tumbling down the incline towards the water, tangled up in writhing dead limbs. Like watching a disaster unfold before her eyes, frozen and unable to stop it, everything feels like it’s happening in slow motion.

“ _Mom!_ "

“Abby!”

Clarke and Marcus sound absolutely terrified, but Abby can only focus on jamming her knife into the earth to try and stop sliding any further, and fending off the walker with her other hand. She struggles, craning her head back and away from it as far as she can without taking her eyes off it. The stench of rot is overwhelming this close, and it feels like it’s everywhere, in her nose, her mouth, her pores. The walker’s snarls and the clacking of its teeth are all she can hear. It used to be a man, larger and stronger than her, and it’s weight feels like it’s crushing her. Gritting her teeth and drawing her leg up to dig her heel in its chest, she lets out a cry with the effort of kicking it back. She sucks in a breath, then, with what feels like her last reserve of strength, she pulls her knife out of the mud, propels herself up from where she’s sprawled on her back, forward and over the walker, and embeds it in its brain.

It sags like a puppet with its strings cut, and so does Abby, falling back and gasping, only now feeling like she just came inches from dying. For all she knows she might still, she could have been scratched and she wouldn’t have felt it then or now. She should check, but she can’t bring herself to move.

The others are calling her name, and they sound so far away until Marcus suddenly crashes to his knees next to her, eyes wide and face drained of colour.

“Did it bite you?” There’s a faint note of hysteria in his voice that she’s never heard before, “Abby, are you -?” He cuts himself off and doesn’t wait for her to answer, running shaking hands over her, checking for himself. Abby lets him, drawing comfort from his touch, the slight warmth each time his fingers brush against bare skin, and when she manages to sit up, feeling stiff and heavy, he wraps his arms around her. He holds her tightly, desperately, and Abby lays her head on his shoulder, running a hand up and down his arm.

Something occurs to her, “Is Octavia okay?”

Marcus lets out a noise that’s halfway between a laugh and a sob, “She’s fine. They’re all fine. God, Abby, are _you_ okay?”

She nods a little, but she’s slowly become aware of how uncomfortable her damp and filthy clothing is, and she grimaces,

“I’m wet and muddy and disgusting.”

He snorts, pulls back to look at her, and cups her face. His hands are dirty and his wrists are red, but his smile is radiant enough, as his gaze rakes over her face, that she can’t think of anything but that.

“But you’re alive,” God, how could she ever be worthy of the way he’s looking at her right now? “And you’re beautiful.”

It takes the breath out of her in an entirely different way to her fight with the walker, but before she can think of replying, he ducks down and kisses her, hard.

Her lips part in a gasp (or a moan she’s not sure) and then she’s kissing him back with equal fervour, because this is everything she’s wanted for months now: to know the feel of his mouth on hers, the rough tickle of his beard, her fingers running through soft, overgrown curls. For a moment there is nothing but the heated play of lips, tongue, teeth, learning the taste and feel of each other, and his body flush against hers, holding her as close as he can. And yes, she feels _alive._

“So I’m guessing she’s okay?” An amused Raven calls down to them, and the fact that their kids (because they are all their kids, really, hers and Marcus’) have just witnessed them making out whilst sat on a muddy riverbank has her embarrassed enough to, regretfully, break the kiss and hide her face in Marcus’ neck.

He sighs into her hair, then calls back, “She’s okay!” His thumb is rubbing soothingly at the back of her neck, and Abby raises her head to find him already looking at her, his expression so tender it makes her heart ache in the best possible way. Then, lower, softer, just for her, “We’re okay.”


	3. Chapter 3

At some indeterminate point in the future, where Abby hopes to God they’re all still alive, she thinks they’ll probably look back on the ridiculousness that is her and Marcus trying to climb back up the steep, muddy riverbank and laugh. But right now it is frustrating as hell. There doesn’t seem to be a single part of her body that doesn’t ache, and she feels weighed down considerably by the layers of muck on her clothes, her hair, her skin. Taking halting, staggering steps that probably make her look like she’s already one of the undead, holding onto Marcus only does a certain amount of good until one of them slips and they both go down again.

In the end, the others resort to making a human chain and hauling them up that way, and once Abby has flat stone beneath her feet again, Octavia is hugging her, mindless of the mud and the walker blood, whispering “Thank you” in immense gratitude for Abby’s quick actions. Lincoln meets her eyes over Octavia’s shoulder, his gaze intense and heavy with relief, thanks, regret, guilt. Abby offers a smile that she hopes is reassuring, that she hopes conveys the message: _I would do it again; we are family._ The tension on Lincoln’s face seems to lessen then.

Breaking away from Octavia, sweeping her hand quickly over the girl’s hair, Abby looks over at Clarke, scanning her person for injuries, and breathing a little easier when Clarke immediately sets her mind at ease,

“I’m okay.”

There’s nothing on her face that might give Abby a clue as to how she feels about her mother kissing Marcus Kane. She is no more distant than usual. Abby doesn’t regret the kiss at all, but she does regret not taking her daughter into consideration more. She can’t blame Marcus, who was no doubt driven to such boldness out of sheer relief, and the thought of being haunted by all those missed chances had he lost her. Abby could have kept it brief and chaste, kissed him just long enough to let him know she wasn’t rejecting him, but she’d thrown herself into it just as much as he had, enthusiastically and passionately. And even though she’s starting to shiver in her damp clothes, she feels heat stir in her belly remembering it, a brief flush rising to the surface of her skin. 

Now, as they start walking again, she finds herself feeling uncharacteristically shy. Marcus stays close to her, and the space between them feels like a living thing, cracking with the tension and desire they’d finally given into, that was then interrupted. They are unfulfilled, wanting. Abby glances towards him and finds him watching her. They share a small, secret smile and she leans ever so slightly towards him, letting their hands brush together, the slightest touch leaving sparks in its wake. They are surrounded by teenagers, but only they are behaving as such. It’s stupid, and probably dangerous, that they are paying more attention to each other than their surroundings, but Abby feels a little giddy anyway.

There’s a sensible, worried voice in the back of her mind, that will probably start screaming later; that this is the worse possible time to be feeling this, that this situation is the very reason she’d put her feelings for Marcus on the back burner for so long. But the dam has broken now, she knows what it’s like to kiss him, and she can’t go without that feeling anymore now that she knows. She resolves not to shut him out when the panic inevitably sets in.

She feels a different, much more familiar panic when she starts eyeing his wrists again…

Finally, Octavia up front lets out a small squeak of excitement, before clapping a hand over her mouth to silence herself, and Abby thinks maybe the universe has decided to grant them recompense for all the shit it’s seen fit to throw at them lately. About a mile from the river is what looks like a hunting lodge, tucked away out in the woods. It’s of a fair size; they’ve certainly shared far more cramped spaces before. And once a quick perimeter check reveals a generator and spare fuel tanks, Abby feels herself beginning to get excited at thought of hot running water. If they can get it running.

As if reading her mind, Raven steps towards it with a whispered, “On it.” and Abby automatically follows her with the intention of watching her back whilst she works.

The others start back towards the front entrance, wordlessly getting into formation, ready to clear any walkers that might lurk within. All seems silent and still, but they’ve known walkers to sink into an almost dormant state if left cooped up and undisturbed for a long time. Abby catches Clarke’s, then Marcus’, eye with a nod to be careful. Gone is the lightness of her and Marcus’ earlier gentle flirting; he is serious, focused, lips set in a firm line even as he lingers for a moment, drinking her in, before turning abruptly and forcing himself to walk away. He was a cop before the Turn, and it shows in the way he shuts the emotions away and is all business when others are depending on him.

The only sound and movement then comes from Raven, tinkering quietly. Abby barely even breathes, waiting with her heart in her throat. The only thing worse than walkers being in there would be finding other people. There are very few people left who haven’t adopted the ‘shoot first, don’t even bother asking later’ way of living.

The minutes stretch unbearably long, and Abby tells herself the continued lack of noise is a good thing, tightens her grip uselessly on her knife, until Clarke comes round the corner again, and something that was pulled taught for so long relaxes inside Abby. She can’t remember the last time Clarke smiled like that.

“It’s okay. It’s better than okay,” She’s no longer whispering and practically vibrating with excitement. Abby feels herself daring to hope, “Come on!”

Abby and Raven, pausing in her task momentarily, follow her into the lodge, and what they see is honesty a dream.

There is enough natural light shining through the windows to illuminate the living room, dust mites floating through sunbeams as the others pull faded, grubby white sheets from where they were covering the furniture. Abby is struck first and foremost by how all she can smell is a stale mustiness, the smell of a space that has simply been devoid of life for a long time. There is no stench of death.

They uncover a small wooden dining table and chairs, a couple well worn leather arm chairs facing a fireplace, some lamps and a fairly full bookcase. There’s a thick rug covering the carpet in front of the fireplace. It could easily be quite cosy.

“This isn’t the best part.” Clarke murmurs next to her, practically linking her arm through Abby’s (she feels a ridiculous amount of emotion at this one familiar gesture, for a moment it’s like the two of them are as they were before the end of the world), and tugs Abby into the bathroom.

There’s a tub and a shower head attached to the wall over it (please, God, let Raven get the generator up and running, she thinks, desperately), a sink with a mirror that Abby very deliberately does not look into, and a cabinet that Clarke goes to. When she opens it, grinning back at her mother, Abby feels almost dizzy with relief.

Bandages, steri-strips, antiseptic wipes and cream, even a couple bottles of pills that, on closer inspection, seem to contain generic painkillers and antibiotics. There’s an expiration date to these things, but beggars can’t be choosers. Hunting accidents can happen, Abby supposes, and whoever owned this place kept it well stocked with medical supplies in case something happened.

A disbelieving laugh bubbles up out of no where,

“ _God…_ ”

“It’s like it’s too good to be true, isn’t it?” Clarke echoes her thoughts out loud. It’s the kind of suspiciousness that’s ingrained in them now, that’s kept them alive, but her daughter is still smiling, and Abby is too tired to question their good fortune right now.

“Clarke!” Bellamy is calling her, and though he doesn’t sound panicked, the two of them react with urgency, running from the bathroom (as much as Abby’s body will allow her to run.)

“What? What is it?”

They storm into the living room just as Marcus emerges from the kitchen with a can of food in each hand and an easy smile on his face.

“I don’t know if whoever owned this place _meant_ to stock up for the end of the world but…” He holds the food up, “There’s more in the cupboard.”

Abby’s stomach growls on cue, she’s tried to ignore just how starving she is.

“And I found this in one of the bedrooms.” Bellamy is cradling a hunting rifle in his arms like it’s his first born child.

Octavia snorts at her brother, “You got ammo for that?”

He nods, “Hell yeah.” Reaches into his back pocket and rattles a box of bullets at her.

“Kind of ironic isn’t it?” Octavia murmurs, “This place has everything, it’s perfect. It’s out of the way, close to a water source. But whoever it belonged to…”

“It doesn’t seem like they made it here.” Clarke finishes, and Octavia nods.

Abby has been thinking it too, this place has been untouched for a long time. Since before the Turn.

“Well, their loss is our gain.” Bellamy shrugs, and Clarke gives him a look that seems to say: _don’t be an asshole, it’s beneath you._

There’s suddenly a rumbling sound like an engine turning over, and the clanking of pipes coming back to life. Raven bursts through the door with a triumphant smirk, Lincoln trailing after her looking quietly amused.

“Victory is mine, I am a genius!” She holds out her hands like a benevolent God bestowing hot water upon lowly mortals, “You all love me. Bring me the finest canned spam in all the land.”

Abby sways into Marcus, who has naturally drifted over to her, and dissolves into giggles against the crook of his neck, whilst Clarke, Bellamy and Octavia descend on Raven with hugs and noises of delight. Marcus puts his arm around her and sighs into her hair. For now they get to rest with a roof over their heads. Abby daren’t think that they are safe, no where is safe anymore, but she will enjoy this for as long as she can.


	4. Chapter 4

“And!” Raven calls out from the group hug she’s currently in the centre of, being smothered, by the sounds of it, “Because I got the generator up and running, and because I’m so awesome, I say Abby gets first dibs on the shower.”

“No, Raven, it should be you,” Abby is already protesting; her need to take care of everyone else overpowering the part of her brain that yearns to be warm and clean, and is screaming at her to shut up, “Besides, I need to take care of Marcus’-”

Raven interrupts her, “Abs, I love you, but you smell the worst.”

“Can’t argue with that.” Marcus chuckles, and Abby immediately springs away from where she is leaning against him. She can hear the others trying to reign in their amusement, too.

“You could have said I disgusted you.” She mutters, embarrassed and a little hurt. It’s irrational; she knows it’s only the truth.

“Oh, for -” Marcus steps in close again, ignoring the kids, “You don’t _disgust_ me, by any stretch of the imagination. I’m just in favour of you going first. Taking care of _yourself_ first.”

“You need -”

“Tell you what,” Marcus interrupts her, earning himself an indignant glare, she really wishes people would stop doing that. “Why don’t we head in that general direction,” he gestures towards the bathroom, “And you can fight me on the way?”

And so Abby finds herself being guided with a gentle hand at the small of her back, away from the group of younger people who have decided to ignore them, and are instead in heavy discussion about lighting the fireplace and scrounging up a meal. It only occurs to her once she’s standing in the middle of the bathroom, and Marcus has clicked on the light, that she hasn’t been alone with him since their kiss. She feels a flutter of nervousness in her stomach, even as she mentally berates herself for being stupid; it’s still only Marcus. Except they aren’t _only_ anything anymore.

She turns to the medicine cabinet, opening and pulling out the things she needs,

“I can’t believe our luck here,” She says, “How this place hasn’t been picked clean already…”

She has her back to him and is still fumbling for supplies when he murmurs her name, deep and husky, and she shivers. She turns to find him a lot closer than she expected, and he blows away any lingering awkwardness between them by ducking down and, oh so gently this time, pressing his lips to hers.

Their second kiss is nothing like the first; it is sweet, achingly tender, mere brushes of lips and the sharing of breaths. Abby sighs and melts against him. This is good, this is easy, she really should stop overthinking things.

Marcus’ hands find her hips, and he strokes his thumb against the bare skin just above her waistline. It’s feather-light, but Abby feels a throb low in her belly anyway; it’s somewhere he’s never touched her and she wants him to explore more, map her with his fingertips.

When he breaks the kiss he looks down at her with dark, hesitant eyes, thumb still tracing that same patch of skin, but, maddeningly, going no further.

“There is, of course, a way you can take that shower I can tell you want so badly, _and_ clean my wrists at the same time.”

Abby’s body reacts with a jolt of arousal even before her brain can fully process what she dearly _hopes_ he is suggesting. She doesn’t think she’s wrong by the way a glint of intent flashes through his eyes, even if he also looks as though he’s expecting rejection. Or perhaps a slap. Her heart is racing already at the mere thought of being wet, warm and naked with Marcus. How will she cope with the reality of it? She’s seen his body before. It is, after all, hard to live in close quarters with another person for nearly two years without forgoing a certain amount of privacy. She’s also had to patch him up plenty of times, with him in various states of undress. But there’s a vast difference between forcing herself to be clinical, and touching him because she _wants_ to. She thinks about trailing her hands down his bare chest, chasing water droplets, stroking his cock…

There’s an ache starting to build in her core, and a flush rising to the surface. Marcus’ eyes are flickering over her face, drinking her in, and she wonders what he sees; how obvious is she in her desire for him? Whatever it is, he seems to like it, arching an eyebrow playfully, a growing smile that she just wants to kiss.

“Okay then.” Her own voice comes out throaty, and she can see, with a sense of smugness, it’s effect on him. “We should save water, after all.”

He snorts, and it breaks the tension a little. “ _Shower with a friend_ , Abby? Really?”

She lets herself full on grin at him, “I’ll get things started here, and you go see if you can find us some towels? A change of clothes? I _really_ don’t want to put these back on.” She wrinkles her nose at herself, “In fact I want to burn them.”

He huffs another laugh (she delights in making him smile, wishes it would happen more often), and leaves the room, whilst Abby steps over to the tub and turns the shower on. This is where it all goes wrong, she thinks, where the water stays icy cold, or doesn’t work at all. But it bursts to life, water coming out in a steady stream, already starting to warm up when she holds her hand under it, testing. She bites her lip in a moment of indecision: she could wait for him to come back, but she fears her courage might fail her. If she gets in first then it’s up to Marcus to join her, to make good on what was his suggestion in the first place. She leaves it up to him to make the brave decision, feeling guilty only up until she’s stripped out of what’s left of her clothes, hopped to stand in the bath tub, and finally hot water hits her skin.

She can’t help the groan that escapes, because, dear God, surely nothing has ever felt this good? She tugs the shower curtain along the rails to give herself a moment of privacy, tilts her head back under the spray and closes her eyes. Heat suffuses her, all her muscles relaxing. She spots a bar of soap in the dish under the shower head. God knows how old it is, but she snatches it up anyway, lathering and scrubbing at her body and the thick, long tangle of her hair.

“Abby?”

Marcus is back and she can’t even bring herself to be nervous, because she just really wants him to feel this for himself.

“I’m never leaving this shower, so you’d better get in here.”

She opens her eyes to find steam rising and clouding the air, and can make out the blurred shape of Marcus moving on the other side of the curtain. She looks down and feels both disgusted and satisfied with the reddish brown water swirling down the drain, the layers of blood and grime erased, washing away. But her hands will never be clean again.

She doesn’t get to chase this train of thought, because Marcus’ voice is suddenly closer, right on the other side of the curtain, “Are you sure?”

His tone is patient, tender, and this concern for her well-being over his own discomfort is so quintessentially Marcus, so very much the man she loves, that it erases all doubt.

“Come here.” Is all she says, and shivers when the curtain flutters, letting in cold air as he steps into the bath.

It’s like he appears through the steam, a vision, and he’s looking at her with both reverence and hunger. Abby takes his hand immediately and draws him closer, under the spray. He reacts just as she did, eyes falling closed with a low rumble in his chest that _does things_ to her, and makes her long to draw that noise from him herself. She makes him switch places with her so he can get his head under the stream, and reaches up to comb his hair back with her fingers, as the water runs through it, watching his eyes flutter closed again in pleasure. She’s so close to him that her nipples, peaked and sensitive, are brushing lightly against his chest. The sensation makes her wish for his hands, his mouth.

She continues to run both hands through his hair, washing it with the soap, and unabashedly drinks him in with her eyes: water streaming over those broad shoulders that all too often carry the weight of the world. He is lean, as she imagines they all are, without a consistent source of food for so long, defined muscles built up over years of hard living. Her gaze follows the scattering of dark hair trailing down his chest and stomach, to the juncture of his thighs, heavy cock already semi hard. Unconsciously, she licks her lips and hears him gasp softly: he sees her looking.

“Abby…” He is breathless, and when she looks back up to meet his burning gaze it takes her breath away, too. It flickers over her body like a teasing caress, then he finally touches her, resting a hesitant hand at the curve of her waist. She puts the soap in the tray, and the other hand falls from his hair to cup his cheek, his beard a gentle prickle against her thumb as she strokes it back and forth. Marcus leans into it and sighs, and she is struck by how vulnerable he looks right now; she feels a sharp pang somewhere within her chest.

The dark bruises marring his skin remind her of his initial reasoning behind sharing the shower, and she takes his hand again, turning his palm upward so she can inspect the entry wound on the inside of his wrist.

“You’re ruining the moment.” He pouts, and she can’t stop herself from smiling just a little.

“Too bad.”

He sucks in air between his teeth when the spray hits his wrist directly, pink droplets rolling away. Abby wipes her thumbs over it lightly, then trails her finger tips over his palm, along his own fingers,

“Can you feel that?” He nods and she doesn’t think there’s any permanent nerve damage to worry about. “Make a fist.” He manages, though it clearly pains him to clench his hand. Again, Abby thinks of how much it hurt him to hold a weapon. How he fought with the others anyway. “Move your fingers for me?”

Instead of obeying, he smirks, leans in, nuzzles into her neck, and whispers in her ear,

“Where would you like me to move them?”

His other hand drifts up from her waist to brush the underside of her breast. He thumbs her nipple and Abby loses all concentration, pushing herself into his touch. She gives in, loops her arms around around his neck and draws him down into a kiss. It quickly grows deep, heated. He sucks on her bottom lip, and they both moan, open mouthed, when she presses her body fully against his. Abby chases his taste with her tongue, and loses herself in the slide of hot, wet skin on skin. Marcus’ strong arms are around her now, holding her so tightly, as if afraid she might disappear, and she ends up murmuring to him between kisses:

“I’m here… We’re here.”

They keep kissing and kissing and exploring, with lips, tongues, teeth. Marcus’ beard prickles deliciously against her skin when he kisses down her neck and ducks his head to lavish attention on her breasts. Pleasure is a current thrumming under her skin and shooting to the centre of her, where she knows she’s wet and swollen, _throbbing._

It isn’t long before he’s desperately hard, the length of him trapped between their stomachs, and Abby’s hips are rising, grinding against him. But there’s too much of a height difference for her to line them up and get pressure where she needs it, and she hears herself whine with frustration even as he’s panting into her neck and clutching her hips.

“I need… Marcus, I need -”

Suddenly he’s turning them, pressing her back under the spray and against the wall, the cold tile making her arch her back and towards Marcus’ mouth as he kisses his way down her body, sinking to his knees…

_Oh._

Whatever she was going to say before, whatever it was she thought she needed, this is better.

The first touch of his tongue, a long, slow lick, has her gasping, her hips bucking forward, and he retreats, just a little, to reclaim his hold on her hips and to flash her a wicked smile. Then, watching her watching him, he leans in again, and then his lips, his tongue, his beard are sliding through her folds, and Abby is stifling a cry.

Marcus sucks lightly on her clit, flicks his tongue over it, and Abby can’t keep her eyes open anymore, her head falls back against the wall with the onslaught of pleasure, waves of white heat that ripple and pulse from where his mouth is relentless on her. She reaches out to thread her fingers in his wet hair again, partly to steady herself, but mostly to keep him exactly where he is.

How she’d been wrong before, when she thought nothing could possibly feel better than stepping into this shower.

The tension is coiling tighter in her lower belly, she can feel it rising, and she can’t stop herself from rocking against Marcus’ tongue, nor hold back the breathless whimpers and moans. So close…

He seems to know she’s chasing more pressure, suckles, and lays his tongue in hard, messy circles on her clit until _yes_ , she’s coming, flying, cresting the wave. And Marcus keeps going, keeps kissing and licking and _savouring_ her until it’s too much. She’s over sensitive and her hips are jerking with aftershocks when she tugs on his hair, beckoning upwards.

“Marcus, kiss me.”

He stands, looking pleased with himself, “I thought I was.”

Abby just surges forward, capturing his mouth in a bruising kiss, tasting herself, and it’s her turn to feel smug when she runs her fingers up the heavy, hard length of his cock, and he pulls away to drop his head onto her shoulder, groaning.

She wraps her hand around him fully, circles the red, swollen head with her thumb and looks down to see a bead of moisture already at tip. He is so hard, straining, hot and smooth in her grip, that she wonders at how far along he is already, before realising just how much it must have aroused him, going down on her. And judging by the noises he’s making, muffled into her neck, he won’t last much longer.

She wants badly to take him deep inside, to feel every inch of Marcus filling her, and get as close to him as possible; to feel intimately every twitch and shudder as he finishes. But she’s aware of their lack of birth control. Even if she’s not sure she _can_ get pregnant anymore, it would be irresponsible and dangerous to risk it.

Inspiration strikes instead, and, unbeknownst to him, she grabs the soap, lathering up her free hand before slipping it down the length of him, slick and tight.

“Fuck, Abby!” His voice is wrecked with need, and he’s thrusting erratically into her hand now, chasing friction. She cups his face, trying to get him to raise his head; she wants to watch him. His eyes are hooded, pupils blown huge with desire, wet curls a mess from where she’s run her hands through them. He presses his forehead to hers, and then it’s just a few more strokes until his hips are jerking, his cock pulsing in her hand. Shudders wrack his body, and he growls into her mouth, kissing her messily.

Abby wraps her arms around Marcus’ shoulders, his winding tightly around her waist, and they lean their heads together again, catching their breath, sharing giddy smiles, soft laughter, and sweet kisses.

“We didn’t exactly conserve water, did we?” She murmurs, amused.

“We really didn’t.”

Neither of them are sorry. When they shut off the water and step out of the shower, Abby feels like a new person. She can exist in this little bubble with Marcus for a while longer and keep the nightmares at bay, both in dreams and waking.

They dry off with threadbare towels that Marcus managed to find, along with some men’s clothing that’s ridiculously oversized on Abby, so she just pulls on a warm flannel shirt that falls to mid-thigh. Once he’s dressed too, she rolls up her sleeves and makes him sit on the lid of the toilet, grabbing the medical supplies from where she’d left them earlier.

He quirks an eyebrow at her when she kneels between his legs, and she rolls her eyes in reply, and so what if they’re indulging themselves with this brand new aspect to their relationship? They’ve earned it.

She tries to make it as painless as possible, but still ends up wincing in sympathy every time he hisses or flinches when the antiseptic burns. Eventually she’s satisfied his wounds are clean, applied the butterfly stitches, and wrapped his wrists in several layers of gauze. The bandages look so white, pristine and sterile in a way _Dr Abigail Griffin_ finds comforting.

They make their way back to the living room, hand in hand, now warm and cosy due to the fire cracking away, casting the room in a dim, orange glow. The others are digging into various cans of food, but look up when they enter, and apparently it’s obvious to them what she and Marcus have been doing. Or maybe they just suspect until Abby feels herself blushing and Raven snorts,

“Nice, guys.”

Octavia is apparently inspired, makes a “hmm” sound and grabs Lincoln’s hand, leading him purposefully towards the bathroom. Clarke is wincing, as though she’s just been scarred for life by information she _really_ didn’t need, and gravitates to Bellamy, who simply smirks from his seat at the windowsill, on watch.

They eat tinned vegetables and heat up soup over the fire, allowing Raven’s good natured teasing, and when they manage to snag one of the two bedrooms to themselves (Abby thinks it’s because they’re afraid she and Marcus will carry on and have sex whether they’re alone or not. Which is ridiculous, they can control themselves, but if it means she gets to sleep in a real bed, she’s not going to dissuade that notion) she feels content.

Marcus returns from working out a watch schedule with Bellamy and buries under the covers with her, wrapping himself around her from behind.

“You’re smiling.” He whispers into her ear, and Abby hums an affirmative. “It’s lovely.”

“It’s because of you.” She flips onto her back and gazes up at him as he props himself up on one elbow. She’d happily remain here, between sinking down into the mattress and pillows, and the warm, solid press of Marcus’ body. His expression is utterly relaxed and open. _Adoring_ , she thinks, and cards a hand through the soft curls falling over his forehead. “Well, a shower, a bed, food, and an orgasm are things to smile about too.”

He laughs, easily, “I think you’ll find I can at least take credit for the last one.”

“Mmm, I’ll say.” She tangles her fingers in the hair at the nape of his neck and pulls him down into a deep, languid kiss.

She’ll never get enough of this, she decides. She went so long denying herself, afraid of what happened with Jake happening again. Afraid of having to put down another monster wearing the face of the man she loves. But seeing him nailed down, helpless in a way she’s never seen him before, inches from death, it made her understand that, even without knowing his touch or his kiss, the love was already there, and it would already kill her to lose him. They hadn’t saved themselves, or protected their hearts, by not allowing this to happen, they had only wasted time.

Abby’s chest aches with a sudden well of emotion, her throat tight. She gasps against his lips and it comes out as a sob, and Marcus pulls back, frowning.

“Abby?” His gentle concern makes her want to cry all the more, but she swallows it down, shaking her head. “Hey, what is it?”

His pulse is thrumming against her fingertips. _Alive, alive…_

“I’m sorry I took so long.” Her voice trembles, “I’m sorry we wasted so much time. The world how it is now, we can’t afford -”

Marcus shushes her, and somehow seems to understand, pouring out words of comfort. “It’s okay, it’s okay. We’re here now. Yeah?” Abby nods and he smiles, “We’re here, and we’re alive. We took as long as we were supposed to.”

She gives a laugh that is half a sob, “You don’t believe in fate.”

“Perhaps not.” He rolls onto his side and gathers her up against his chest. Abby winds her arms around him, nuzzling into the hollow of his throat and breathing him in. “I just know us. I know we were afraid of the same thing. And it took one too many brushes with death for us to stop being stupid.”

She laughs wetly again, clutches a handful of his shirt.

“We’re still here.” She says, and feels him nod.

“And we’re in this together.” He runs a hand up and down her spine, soothing, “Sleep, Abby. I’m not going anywhere.”

“You’ll wake me when you go on watch?” She murmurs, already drifting, giving in to the heavy pull of sleep.

“I will, I promise.”

He presses a kiss to her forehead and Abby finally lets exhaustion pull her under. It isn’t long before Marcus follows her into a deep, dreamless sleep.


End file.
